


Happen

by thequidditchpitch_archivist



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, Friendship, Hogwarts Era, Minor Character Death, The Quidditch Pitch: From Diagon Alley to Hogwarts, Tragedy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-03
Updated: 2009-01-03
Packaged: 2018-10-26 12:39:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10786923
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thequidditchpitch_archivist/pseuds/thequidditchpitch_archivist
Summary: Hermione Granger didn’t mean for it to happen that way.





	Happen

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Annie, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [The Quidditch Pitch](http://fanlore.org/wiki/The_Quidditch_Pitch), which went offline in 2015 when the hosting expired, at a time I was not able to renew it. I contacted Open Doors, hoping to preserve the archive using an old backup, and began importing these works as an Open Doors-approved project in April 2017. Open Doors e-mailed all authors about the move and posted announcements, but may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact us using the e-mail address on [The Quidditch Pitch collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/thequidditchpitch/profile).

She didn’t mean for it to happen that way. It wasn’t anything like the way she’d read it was supposed to be. Once it was done, sure, it was fine, it was gone. But she didn’t really know how to respond once it was over, after the tears and the pain and the blood was disconnected from her memories.

 

For all her smarts and cleverness, she didn’t realize what the problem was until rather late in the game. In fact, she’d barely come to terms with the fact of the thing’s existence when the forced cramps slowly started up. There were a couple of things she’d considered, and though her sources seemed reliable enough their information often conflicted. But one downfall to her bookishness was that she considered all books to be law, and therefore she didn’t know which source to choose, which one was best. 

 

It hadn’t made much of a difference after it started to happen.

 

One book had said that it was going to be quick and done with. Another claimed that it was a long, arduous process. Both stressed the fact of extreme pain. But Hermione Granger was going to do it, and she was going to do it right. Her parents were dentists; she’d grown up visiting her father in his office, watching his patients groan and their faces crumple under the fluorescent lights. She had personal experience dealing with pain, seeing as Harry managed to include her and Ron into every skirmish he got into. 

 

So she was prepared enough for what was coming, mentally. She did not know which book to trust, but it didn’t much matter, did it? She had prepared herself as best she could.

 

It had been a mistake. She hadn’t even meant to be with him that night; it had happened quite by chance. It wasn’t her first time. She was not the bright virgin herald of Hogwarts, but neither was she a slut. She was just a girl, and she was not any different from any other girl her age just because of her intelligence. Sure, she was usually more on top of things than she had been that night in October, but it wasn’t the first time—nor would it be the last—Hermione was at the disposal of her emotions and hormones.

 

So it happened, and she knew within a few weeks just what had come from one night’s accidental endeavors. Hermione was a girl, but she was a very smart girl, and knew immediately that there was no way she could keep this thing. But she also knew herself pretty well, and knew that if she decided to go through with the pregnancy and have it adopted, she would not be able to part with it once it was all over. It was with mixed emotions that she approached Snape’s spare classroom store cabinet one class period, the ingredients for a special kind of potion tucked carefully into her palm. 

 

She kept the goings-on very secret and made sure nobody could smell the fumes of her precious concoction while she attended to it in Myrtle’s bathroom. And when she imbibed it, she made sure she was alone before walking out into the masses to finish up the rest of her day. 

 

The cramps were slow to begin, and at first she wasn’t even sure it was happening. It was. Quickly the clenching was so painful that she could hardly stand it. But she knew it was for the best, for both her sake and the thing’s—referring to it that way was the only way she could convince herself to go through with it. Hermione was one for compassion and empathy, but knowing what this would do to her, to her life, to her family, to everything and everyone she knew, she continued on with her day as though nothing special were happening.

 

Finally, after a long while, the false contractions were coming so painfully and so close together that she could not physically stay upright. She’d managed to find a place alone after classes, but something was going wrong. Though the books disagreed with the length of her suffering, both agreed that it would end. This was not ending.

 

Hermione stumbled into the infirmary, half-dazed for the pain, crying for Madame Pomfrey. It was late, but the resident nurse soon ventured from her adjoining office to find the screaming student. She threw herself into action once she realized just who and just what it was. And at 1:37 in the morning on the second of December, 1996, Hermione Granger miscarried and gave birth to an already dead baby boy. 

 

She wept where she felt it was necessary for Pomfrey's sake, but otherwise did her best to detach herself from what had just happened to her, what she had just done to herself. It was with a cold, vacant wave goodbye that Hermione left the infirmary eight hours later, no one the wiser (but for Pomfrey, and she was sworn to secrecy). Those who saw her that day, saw how disconnected she looked, how out of it she was, attributed it to a recent cutback in Library funding. Madame Pomfrey just assumed that the girl was sad for the loss.

 

She hadn’t meant for it to happen that way. For all her smarts and cleverness, Hermione Granger had not understood the implications of her actions, of her power to change things. 

 

She hadn’t meant for it to happen.

 


End file.
